1/ the funeral was held today for the Yezidi leader Mam Zekî Şengalî, assassinated by a targeted Turkish airstrike while returning from a commemoration of a massacre of only four years ago, I thought I would commemorate him by tweeting some extracts from a visit to Shengal in May
2/ Mam Zekî Şengalî was one of those who received us, & gave us a summary of the current situation in Shengal (Arabic SInjar), and of events leading up to the genocide of August 2014, which the Yezidis refer to as a "ferman", which also means "order of the Sultan"
3/ Shengal, they emphasised, has not recovered from 2014; Daesh (ISIS) may be gone but devastation & destruction is everywhere, the city lies in ruins [we witnessed this; it was comparable to Raqqa] & many of those who fled have not returned which makes rebuilding difficult
4/ people he said have not overcome the mental obstacles either, they fear Daesh or something similar will return. The education system is still in tatters. We've opened a couple schools of our own that use Latin characters but not nearly enough ..
5/ there is also little work, he emphasised ("we don't like to use term “employment” as we don't want it necessarily to take the form of jobs). international institutes donate money, but at most 10% gets here, & that under control of only a small number of people
6/ very little donations or aid money ends up getting to the poor or survivors. The Iraqi state has done nothing to develop this area, and promised aid never arrives.
7/ "at the moment all Iraq is in process of elections and we don't know how things will turn out, but here we have an autonomous democratic assembly, a movement called TevDa, (Parti Yezidi Demokratiyen)
8/ This movement has also formed a political party and is running in elections as the "Party of Democracy & Freedom for Yezidis"
9/ There are three main military forces in the region: 1. Yezidi self-defence forces YBS & Yezidi women's forces YBJ, 2. the Iraqi army, 3. the Haadz-al-Shaadi. The latter two also have some Yezidis serving in them. The Peshmerga (Kurdish Iraqi forces) no longer operate here
10/ most Peshmerga fed, refusing to defend us during the genocide of 2014, but any remaining Peshmerga left when the Haadz-al-Shaadi came. The army has some mixed checkpoints with both HaS with our self-defence forces.
11/ In Shengal we Yezidis have built up our own institutions, which include: a municipal council, women's movement, & youth movement. The Iraqi gov't refuses to recognise any, claiming they still recognise the municipal assembly from before the genocide that no longer exists
12. On 14 Jan 2015, we formed the founding assembly; after PKK & YPG come to stop the genocide we held elections & these became a regular regional assembly; the old city council became entirely inactive. (HaS also appointed official governors, but these too only exist on paper.)
13/ When Daesh entered Mosul [in June 2014], we as TevDa & Shengal regional assembly thought to create self-defense forces; we traveled, talked to young people… We even went to Rojava to meet for advice on his to do this
14/ As a result the YPG said 'if you send us volunteers we can give them a 2 week training in AK47s, etc.' We sent 3 groups, & the last was still in training when the genocide began. When the corridor was opened to rescue us, our own forces were among those who saved us
15/ the YPG provided weapons & ammo, mostly guns but such heavier stuff as they had. 3 days before the genocide, we were about to declare our own self-defense forces. 150 fighters had been trained, & we hoped to train another 1000 and position them around the area
16/ however it was very difficult, because the KRG (the autonomous government of the Kurdish region of Iraq) was steadfastly opposed to the project & threw every sort of obstacle in our way
17/ the only people who helped us other than the YPG in Rojava were the PKK in Qandil. There was also a group of 12 experienced PKK cadres who came to advise people on self-defence for when Daesh attacked; 3 were arrested on the way by the KDP, but 9 reached us.
18/ 6 August 2014 was the day we were were going to declare the formation of our self defense forces; both Daesh and the KDP (ruling party of Iraqi Kurdistan) were aware of that; the first attack seems to have been to head this off a few days before
19/ It appears to have been planned for the day of a major Yezidi religious festival, when people would be unprepared; the Peshmerga forces [loyal to the KRG] who had insisted we not form our own defence forces then left without firing a shot when Daesh advanced
20/ on the day of the festival, when the attack began they took all their weapons, including heavy weapons, & they withdraw to North, leaving people terrified. 150,000 fled to the mountains, where they were besieged. There was no water, conditions were terrible.
21/ Within two days, HPG guerrillas from the PKK & YPG forces (including some of our own trainees) opened a corridor to protect people on the mountain side, and opened way for the 150k to pass to Rojava. Truly it can be said they were saved from death.
22/ We with the popular organizations here told people not to leave, because we feared they would not be allowed to return. About 1000 families remained, & all their young people joined self defense forces, & young people in Bashur [Iraqi Kurdistan] also returned to join.
23/ 16-18 March 2015, we organized a conference that officially created the YBS (Resistance Units of Shengal), YJS (Women's Units of Shengal). Aside from the PKK, there were no other forces at all, no Iraqi army, no Peshmerga to help us. Many were martyred in battle against Deash
24/ In the past, some of us wanted to become Peshmerga but Yezidis not allowed. Once we were liberated from Daesh, the KRG tried to create a new Peshmerga force for Yezidis, which would of course be paid, to lure young people away from us.
25/ Then the Haadz-al-Shaadi militia arrived, then only a month ago the Iraqi army appeared, too, all in an effort to break the will of the people and our ability to decide things for ourselves.
26/ Autonomy is possible; Yezidis are very linked to the land, we can live off farming & animal husbandry here as long as the women's and mixed self-defense forces are allowed to remain here to protect us, we are perfectly capable of self-sufficiency
27/ We have fought & died to preserve the integrity of Iraq & if they took their own nationalism seriously they'd see that, but they don't; they've imposed a sham democracy, there are elections, but they're meaningless, the real ruling forces share out power amongst themselves
28/ they've been trying to use Yezidi internal structures to enslave us; throwing money & privileges to buy off traditional chiefs & leaders, draw them into KRG patronage network. TevDa formed in 2014, but KDP hasn't allowed us to work, afraid we'd free people from their control
29/ [added by a member of YBJ - women's forces] you can see what happened to women at the time of the genocide; no forces would protect us. All political parties were entirely male dominated. This is why we were attracted to Apo's ideology that stressed women's empowerment
30/ "in the genocide, women were the main targets. This was true in past genocides as well: they target women as the major conveyors of culture and tradition. The violence was not only physical but cultural, & women's self-defense forces were created to resist both"
31/ At first we were very small groups, isolated; after the genocide, our demands could no longer be ignored. We pointed out if more women had known how to use a gun, to team up, not so many would have fallen into the hands of ISIS & been enslaved.
32/ "slowly we become autonomous creatures ourselves as well; YBJ is not just physical self-defense but a bottom-up organization of women. As you know, women were enslaved and taken to cities like Mosul and Raqqa. We came to Raqqa for vengeance, but a vengeance to free women"
33/ "and we did, we fought our way ultimately to Raqqa, the very capital of their empire, & ultimately we managed to free several hundred women who had been taken there, and in some cases members of their families as well."
34/ "still, more than 3000 women remain in ISIS hands, & most we don't know where they are; just this month 16 Yezidi women were kidnapped and enslaved in Afrin, by Jihadis working with the Turkish army. We will not stop until all of them are freed."
35/ [male elder adds] "for centuries we've lived alongside Islamic Arab patriarchal cultures & so our present culture is not the true one; layer after layer of oppression has been added on top of it; from our myths it's easy for see ...
36/ " ... that the position of women, militarily, socially, culturally, was much higher in the past." YBJ soldier adds: "Yezidis have our unique religion; but we're all human; it's our differences that make the world beautiful, because they are the expression of human freedom."
37/ "... and that freedom is our common humanity. This is our fate, the destiny we have, despite all our agonies and suffering, we feel we have no choice but to fight for humanity, for a fraternity of peoples, whether for Shengal, the Middle East, or for humanity as a whole."
38/ here are some pictures of Mam Zeki Şengali from that meeting 
39/ and here is MZS with our delegation, along with some members of YBS & YBJ
